


hey, space cadet

by Jeff_Excellence



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Diamond & Pearl & Platinum | Pokemon Diamond Pearl Platinum Versions
Genre: LGBTQ+ Themes, Team Galactic (Pokemon), Themes of Loneliness, and found family too?, but mayhaps also themes of friendship, elements of the supernatural, i'll add to these tags as the fic develops, loosely based on the plot of pokemon platinum, themes of depression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:21:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25908799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jeff_Excellence/pseuds/Jeff_Excellence
Summary: Something is wrong. There is no reason for Sinnoh to look like this. A young trainer enters the fray on his own, on a quest to save his hometown. But a chance encounter with those on the wrong side of the law leaves him stricken with questions he does not have the means to answer. It falls on him to make sense of his place in a senseless world or let it all fade away in trying.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 10





	1. the world ends in hearthome

**Author's Note:**

> hullo. i tried to write an earlier fic with some of these characters and it turned out bad. so i'm doing it again, but good this time
> 
> incredible thanks to dear friend and lovely writer [wolflyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolflyn/) for the help
> 
> also: there's a server for this fic now! feel free to hop in if you wanna :] <https://discord.gg/x6NchkCmwb>

The weather had been unusually good over the past few days, but there was no time to enjoy it now. Something had gone terribly wrong somewhere down the line, and there was no time to speculate on where, but the issue was simple. Right now Connor Murdoch was alone, hundreds of miles away from home, and he was not equipped for this. How could anyone have been?

This was a matryoshka doll of situations he should not have been in, but long story short, he stood in the Valley Windworks, he had someone to look for, and the corridor ahead of him didn’t seem to end. It stretched out as far as he could see, which admittedly wasn’t that far because the lights were out, but it still raised questions. There could’ve been other explanations, like the chance that unbeknownst to him the building was a miracle of architecture that was so much bigger on the inside than out. Connor couldn’t muster anything more reasonable than this. He knew it didn’t make much sense. He went with it anyway.

A quick glance over his shoulder reassured him the door hadn’t vanished and wasn’t planning to do so any time soon. In spite of what he told himself, he could have left at any moment. Doing so would’ve allowed him to go about the rest of his business without thinking about any of this. Floaroma was a nice town full of nice people, like the guy he’d promised to save. Connor had never met him before, but his eight-year-old daughter loved him enough to chase a complete stranger up for help. She was just the sort of person he just couldn’t bring himself to disappoint.

Sometimes, he wished he had a better brain, or at the very least better ideas. Right now he had nothing except the plastic on his belt and the dark corridor before him. The big room behind him had been empty when he checked it, much to his chagrin. Half-finished work hung over the room, and cold coffee lingered in a mug emblazoned by words: “Best dad in the world.” Out of everything, that stuck with Connor. Good dads don’t leave their children’s gifts behind if they’re going far, and as far as it concerned him, the sort of people who took those gifts away were probably murderers, too. Life was still here, but by process of elimination, it had to be on the other side of shadows.

Connor peered again into the darkness as a bead of sweat trickled down the back of his collar. No foe faced him at the other end of the corridor to be fought with hands or his Pokémon. What was he so afraid of then? He was in control here, he would do this on his own terms. After all, the only sensible reason for the hallway to have been dark was that the lights were off, and not because something was actually _down_ there. That was absurd, and thinking so reassured him as much as it could’ve done. It didn’t get rid of the shadows, though, nor did it mean he was absolved of greeting what lay on the other side of them. If things played out the way he expected— and he considered himself an optimist here— this meant intruding on a hostage situation. That was a big if. He was… scared? Scared was just a word. Some feelings can’t be summed up with a word. Like this one, for example; this was more the sort of feeling that Connor had to promise never to feel again. That promise fell on deaf ears. He stood in an industrial complex at the mercy of hands unseen, with no way out that made him feel any better about himself. He was alone. This was scary. He was scared.

But being scared didn’t help anybody. Action did. Every step on laminate floorboards rang sharp in the air, alerting whoever was in the dark to his approach. Except he swore he was still alone, and there was nothing to be afraid of. Darkness only meant that no lights were on. Besides, nothing moved in the shadows. Empty shadows were as good as a friend.

Something moved in the shadows.

He stopped. His heart almost followed suit. _Something moved in the shadows._

He didn’t hear it make a sound, though he couldn’t say for sure, because his heartbeat drowned out everything else. But just because he hadn’t heard a thing didn’t mean a thing hadn’t heard him. Faltering breaths squeaked out from his dry, chapped lips, and his fingers thrummed against the pocket of his jeans in an uneven rhythm. It was probably nothing… as if “probably” guaranteed safety. Most likely just a wild Drifloon or something; the poor creature was probably the victim of an offhand breeze and got stuck inside. Still, if it attacked him, he would’ve had to fight back. Connor couldn’t risk causing that scene — nor could he risk facing the cops. He tried to make himself as big as possible to ward off the intruder. Which was kind of silly, because he was the intruder, and there’s not much you can do to make yourself big when you’re all of five feet tall.

Something had crept up on him, though. It was a smell. Not a stench; upon arrival it didn’t knock him dead on his feet. Nor was it a particularly bad smell, either; its presence was neutral. Maybe even nice in different circumstances. But not here. No building that was in use every day — no building that was in use _right now_ — should have reeked of dust. Particles scratched against his throat, and he could’ve sworn he was choking. Breathing should have come naturally, like moving, but he found himself unable to do either. He surely hadn’t gone more than five meters this whole time, but the hallway felt five meters darker, only illuminated by leftover specks of light.

Out of instinct, his hand cupped the warm plastic home of his closest friend. The Pokéball was still there — why wouldn’t it have been? Of course, he was unable to do anything with it; hurling it at shadows was at best a waste of energy and at worst certain death.

What path was he to take, then? Plan A had been to pass through without incident, which was such a basic task that he hadn’t considered a plan B necessary. But he stood on the precipice of an incident anyway. It wasn’t like this made leaving any more a noble option, though, because he hadn’t accomplished anything here yet. Here he was, at a crossroads: leave with no dignity, or stay for the sliver of hope that things would turn out alright. He took one step forward… and then another…

Static leaked out of his brain, and the world slipped away from his fingertips. The overflow coalesced in the space behind his right eyeball, drowning itself in his skull. Connor sucked in a sharp breath, only to let it out in a gasp as a searing pain shot across his temples. Trying to keep his head together left him vulnerable to the words that carved themselves across his mind:

_“You will not find your truth here, child.”_

Connor hit the ground with a thud and the screaming of pained palms, nearly heaving at the shock. He considered himself lucky that he hadn’t actually puked, because that would have caused a scene. But it didn’t matter. The scene was already here. He was not alone. Someone _talked_ to him, and he struggled to swallow that: something put words in his brain, and it was nearer to him than he was to the door. It could not have been human. His brain was the only thing he could trust unconditionally, and he wasn’t sure what to do when that trust was violated. In any other situation, he would have been gone in a flash, yet… something bothered him.

Yes, it was absolutely a minor thing compared to the brain intruder, and Connor knew it was, but there was that phrasing. _Your_ truth. Not truth, as a concept. Not the trueness of any one thing. _His_ truth, with the onus to find it on him. As though he’d lost it somehow, or was searching for it here. If it wasn’t here, then where was it?

Not just that, but there was the voice itself; harsh, but not hostile or mean. Growling, not to drive him away but because that was just what it did. Its owner wanted nothing to do with him, but it didn’t feel borne from a place of hatred for anything. Hell, if anything, it sounded more like the opposite: apologetic. Somehow, it knew that by turning him away, it disappointed Connor, and in turn, that disappointed it. Maybe he was looking much too deeply into it, but he was swift to remind himself he wouldn’t find such a truth without looking deeper.

“H-hello?” he managed, as though his whisper wasn’t vastly outweighed by the dark.

There was silence for a few moments. The hairs that ran down Connor’s back all stood up on end. This voice, whatever it belonged to, was clearly capable of speaking to him. That was as much as there was to know about it. Only when he was sure he wasn’t hyperventilating did he plot out his course: if it was capable of speech, maybe it was capable of reason, too. Maybe if he spoke to it nicely, it would give him some direction.

Rising to his feet and dusting off his palms, he found that with fuller lungs came his voice, despite the way his hands stung with the motion. “I, uh… are you still there? I want to talk to you, if, uh, that’s alright?”

His head throbbed, too; the sound sliced into his brain and came out the other side as sharp angles snaking through the air. But he was still in one piece. He repeated himself, more confidently this time: “Hello? You’re still there, aren’t you?”

He didn’t care if anybody heard him; hell, for once he wanted to be heard. He wanted to speak and to be spoken to, if it helped him decipher the strange riddle that bounced around his mind. _Your truth._ How was he supposed to make sense of that without any help?

“Please listen to me. I don’t know who you are, but I’m sure you mean well and I really don’t wanna hurt you. Honest, I swear! You don’t seem so bad at all, and I really appreciate, y’know… you not trying to kill me yet. I was wondering, if… if you could help me out here. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t need to be, but there’s… something bothering me. There’s a kid out there whose dad is in here, and I got sent in to find him, but… uh, here I am, and here you are, and…”

How was he to make sense of any of this, either? Steeling his nerves, he decided he had to try, at least. Those words had to mean _something._

“I don’t understand what you meant, by what you just said to me. Is the truth that there’s nobody’s dad there? Is there something else going on here? And how is it _my_ truth, because I really don’t want to bother anybody, but I don’t know how any of this involves me? Or, um. I guess what I’m trying to say is… I’m a bit lost, and I need you to help me. Is that okay with you?”

Connor waited in the dark for a reply, taking deep breaths and tapping his foot against the ground. _One-two-three. One-two-three. One-two-three._ No answer came from outside his head or in. He was quick to remind himself that, though the voice had not belonged to him, its words came from inside his head.

“I’ve not just said all that to myself, have I?” he muttered between deep breaths. This wasn’t inside his head, because it simply couldn’t have been; when he reached out with his fingertips, the world changed in kind, so this thing that he had heard couldn’t have been his fault. It was _not_ all in his head. Besides, implying this thing didn’t exist to its face wasn’t very nice.

Connor hoped the thing didn’t hate him. It had made its presence known just to tell him to go away, yes. That didn’t have to be anything personal. Maybe it was just doing its job. Or maybe he was just making this up. Connor hoped he didn’t hate himself, at least not right now.

But still, no reply. Connor sighed. All there was to do now was take the plunge and accept the darkness— and the voice— as it was, hoping it let him pass all in one piece.

Deep breaths. Deep breaths were his friend. They established a rhythm in an arrhythmic world. For just a second, the world around him faded away, and he stepped forward ready to try and be stopped.

Only to be jolted to a stop not a few moments later. A sharp sensation exploded in his lower-left abdomen. It took a moment to register, before his eyes followed the pain. Every nerve that ran to his brain screamed at once. A lance as black as night had run him through.

In spite of how much he hurt, he couldn’t scream. He wasn’t there. Instead there were two empty halves, one reaching out for help and the other running for the door. Neither could do anything, which shouldn’t have been the case; he jerked, thrashed about and cried, and none of it did a damn thing. He was a prisoner in his own skull, banging at its walls for dear life, and nobody was there to tell the difference.

The one bit of solace he had was that he didn’t feel dead. There was no way of knowing for sure, but it was supposed to be more natural than this; like your body and soul peacefully parting ways, and you just stop being there. He was acutely aware of most things; he still heard his breathing, felt his lungs expand, but he was slipping. As his consciousness left him, he supposed it was a good thing that he was still around. It wasn’t like dying did anything for Snowpoint, or that guy he was trying to find, or anyone, except for making Mum very, very upset.

It was funny how his last thoughts before everything slipped into darkness weren't that he was scared, or in pain. They were a question: was he really only here to keep others happy?

* * *

Gently, he eased his eyes open. When had he closed them? Before he could answer, light crept in from all corners of his vision so brightly that it stung his retinas. He squinted as the world came back into view, much less familiar than it had been.

It was immediately obvious why it was so bright; there were no walls. The hallway he’d come to know was nowhere to be seen. In fact, the entire Windworks building was gone and he was left sprawled out on his back under the open sky. Except it was nothing like any sky he’d ever seen. A crimson pool had replaced the usual cheery blue, and bits of sludge oozed by, passing themselves off as clouds. Through all the oddity, he spotted something familiar. The rocky spire of Mt. Coronet sliced through the gloom, a burning white halo threatening to swallow it from above. It had an equal chance of being the sun or the moon, but that didn’t matter much; it didn’t resemble either so much as it was an indiscernible white hole around which paint coalesced. Silhouettes pierced the distant sky, their forms closer to decommissioned space shuttles than buildings.

It was all a bit much, really. Looking on at all this, he found himself unable to do anything except blink in disbelief, and ask himself “what the hell?”. None of what he saw could’ve been real; not so soon after he’d been in the hallway on what had _otherwise_ been a fairly normal day. Yet he was there. He felt it as he lay his hands across the ground. They hurt where he had scraped them earlier. He was in this world, touching something in it, and if he wasn’t to trust his sense of touch… what was there to trust?

His fingers curled in frustration, digging his nails into the ground to try to drag himself back to reality, only to find a cold hill had become his unloving mattress. Frost covered every blade of grass, forming one white mass that bit at his tender palms. March was never particularly warm in Sinnoh — no month was, really — but it was never this cold, especially not lately. He sat up, pulling his arms into his chest to try and preserve heat.

Shivering, he squinted into the distance. It was as if the world changed under closer scrutiny. The silhouettes towering over the nearby city morphed into Gothic cathedral spires, spawning a whole city around them. Houses sprung up all around, but every one was devoid of life. As Connor’s eyes followed the roads he noticed they were empty, too. Every single inhabitant of the city took refuge in a great big stadium, painted with oddly muted colours. Only so many people could fit inside. More people straggled along outside it, trying to push and shove their way in.

A part of him wanted to go and join them to see what the fuss was about. But he found himself having second thoughts as he rose to his feet: he loathed crowds. So focused on swallowing down his rising panic, Connor nearly jumped out of his skin as broken church bells screamed across the sky. But it didn’t stop at one chime. One more rang out, then another, then another. The resultant cacophony was a patchwork of noises that fit together like a glove to a foot, loud enough to cleave the sky in half. He watched as the crack spiderwebbed, splitting the sky into sixteen distinct pieces, each drained of any colour.

He knew there were exactly sixteen because he counted them. It was the first thing he thought to do, first off to calm his racing heart, and second to try to inject some reason into what he was witnessing. It made more sense if he operated under the impression that this was a riddle he had the means to solve. Connor liked riddles; they actively discouraged panic. They were tools of logic. They could be explained away. But as he scrambled to explain this one, the noise only digging further into his ears, something horrible dawned on him: there _was_ no explanation. So he started running.

Connor was never the most athletic person, and he was never more acutely aware of this than now. Every sensation that coursed through his body was unpleasant. Carbon dioxide ran like sandpaper against his throat, the grating sensation of which bled down into his lungs. His shins were splintered wood connected to his feet by nothing more than tissue and hope. It didn’t help that the air was as thick as molasses either. In the end all of his efforts to run amounted to very little movement at all. The world moved around him, if anything. It was nothing more than a strange slush of colours now. But though he was alone, he couldn’t shake the feeling something guided him through it.

Was he the center of this universe now? Did everything orbit around him? All these questions swirled around his head, with no immediate hope of an answer in sight. But as he scrambled to unlock whatever puzzle he’d been given, he found something in lieu of a key. It was… less of a thought, really. More of an instinct. Something he wasn’t consciously telling himself and could not justify. Praying had never really been a part of his routine, and he’d never grown particularly acquainted with any form of scripture. But he knew where his legs were carrying him. The unseen hand that guided him was taking him to the house of the gods.

It felt as though the motion of his body existed in tandem with the motion of the world outside him, but there was no stopping either, because he simply couldn’t; all responsibility fell on the white hole in the sky. So when several fingers sprouted out of that hole, each touching horizons in every direction, Connor didn’t know how to process it except to keep running. He watched as the tendrils took a form that lay just outside his grasp. They didn’t seem to have any single colour, shape or set of rules that defined them, and staring at them expecting them to justify their presence felt like walking down an Escherian staircase. They were flatly-prismed-rectangles, black and red and gold and blue at the same time if perceived in different ways. They were holes whose specifics were made up by the brain, it felt; a placeholder perceivable in so many ways but genuine in just one.

Connor was still trying to figure out which one, exactly, when everything jerked in one spasmodic motion, and for a moment he was separated from what he knew. It was the strangest moment he’d ever existed in. No buffer separated him from the rest of the world for a second: the silent filter between his eyes and what they saw vanished, and everything screamed. The sensation was as though sharp metal edges sprouted right into his pink fleshy brain. He found himself looking in all directions but totally unsure what to make of any of it. Everything changed depending on how he looked at it, but no way could’ve been right because everything hung in perpetual change. Beams of light bounced around his head, and the eyes he trusted to decipher this world had failed him. Every sense worked overtime the moment those things sprouted into the sky, every lobe of his brain overpowered by an ether that reeked of ethanol, and though he tried nothing could overcome it.

Finding himself overwhelmed, he blinked. Just for a second. To stop the onslaught.

When his eyes re-opened, there was nothing. He stood alone in the void, save for the object his heart desired. Above him rose the spires of the cathedral. As his eyes swept across the ancient stone, a solid pool settled at the bottom of his chest. It weighed him down, threatening to plunge into his stomach and tangle everything up inside. He took deep breaths, focusing on keeping himself together as though it was all he could do anymore. His gaze swept from the foot of the staircase to the idols perched atop its eaves. He found himself quaking.

Connor had grown up in the ever-looming shadow of the great forbidden temple at the heart of Snowpoint, which survived because people wanted it to survive. They wanted it so hard that basically everyone in town knew someone who worked there. It wasn’t easy, but it was a living, and it kept the temple up. It kept whatever lurked inside it, too. Not that anyone knew what that was, exactly, because they were rarely allowed to disturb it. Entire ecosystems flourished inside those halls, in part because it was too much work to comb over every minute detail of the damn thing and in part because the wild had a right to live there. Nobody knew where it came from, exactly; they just let it be, because it was just as much their home as Snowpoint was Connor’s, or Mum’s, or anyone else’s.

This, on the other hand, was Hearthome Cathedral. This was a monument, a house built for Arceus. Bigger buildings probably existed, but more intimidating ones… seemed out of the question. Even when the sky was something else, those spires still touched it, not ending but instead becoming part of an unpierced rubber ceiling. It had finally merged with a god, yes, but not that one. Against the empty world, those polished marble bricks were the brightest thing he had ever seen; they were so pure and glistened so hard, their light sterile enough to sear pink blotches into his retinas that stayed whenever he blinked. Nothing suggested this was made for living, and nothing had lived there. It stood unblemished without effort, because defiling the houses of the holy was basically heresy. Some people were perfectly happy shoving a middle finger in the faces of the gods. But not here. Not in this place.

As if drawn by a magnet’s pull, Connor trudged forward, footfalls heavier and heavier the closer he came to the foot of the stairs. Traversing the stairway required him to haul his carcass as far as he could know, which the moment dictated was both too far and nothing at all. At the end lay a vanishing point that, as he approached, slowly revealed itself as a doorway. Its doors were made of cross-stitched oakwood and at least three times his size. Like many things, they changed under increasing scrutiny; the oakwood extended and collapsed into an open maw by their own free will.

Every step rang out across the marble floor, reaching an empty world where no sound was heard because nobody was there to hear sound. He was totally alone, like he was the only thing that really existed. The thought made him… content, somehow, as selfish as it was. It was his house now. So into it he went.

The cathedral was hollow, sparse and cavernous, more so than most caves. No light crawled in through any window, though the echo of every footstep gave life to the candles that flanked him; they weren’t much, but they allowed Connor more sight the further in he went. No matter how polished the marble walls were, they devoured the light, giving the impression that the building was held up by rock in its natural form. At the altar, a pair of sharpened pillars jutted out from the walls, crimson chains snaking down their length like veins pumping diluted blood. Before them lay rows of empty pews that could’ve seated thousands. Each was marked with an insignia: a wheel centered on nothing, punctuated by four outward-facing spears with jewels encrusted in each. Connor hadn’t seen such a symbol before, and it stuck with him as he walked further down. It had to mean something, at least _._

But this felt wrong. Hearthome Cathedral’s greatest pride was the stained glass window at the altar. It was so steeped in splendid imagery with so many colours, crafted out of such a deep love for Sinnese lore and all its deities. None of it meant a thing if Connor couldn’t see it. The spectacle had gone, an amorphous blob taking its place in the unlit void. There should’ve been someone there. Was this world devoid of Arceus? Of the rest? Did he somehow supplant the entire pantheon in this realm of nothingness?

It felt weird thinking about all this, because in case that this was actually happening and wasn’t just in his head (which was not, he reminded himself, his fault), there was a real chance this was the last thing that would ever happen, anywhere.

The walk had to end at the altar. The path he had been carried down did not immediately extend beyond this point. Standing before his destination, Connor was faced with the discordant trumpet tones at the end of the universe. A plate lay before him, engraved with the same wheel insignia. Two things sat in its center. One was an entire star distilled into a milky white globe complete with particles locked in an uneven waltz around it. The other was a rock with countless hexagonal faces, so dense that specks of dust seemed to slow as they inevitably fell near it.

An open book sprawled upon the table offered him an explanation. Unfortunately, its contents were written in a vaguely familiar script: ancient Sinnese runes, copied over from carvings on rock face. As recently as last year he studied history, and he hadn’t planned to go any further because his B grade was enough, frankly. This disqualified him from being even close to an expert on runes, or understand any of this outside of maybe a few key words; he leaned in ever closer to the page, hoping that, _maybe,_ he’d be lucky enough—

It was over in an instant, and he was helpless to stop it. A loud crack shattered his eardrums and fire screamed up his spine, searing every one of his nerves; suddenly he wasn’t quite Connor anymore. A streak of bright blue blinded him, and when his eyes re-opened he found all he could do was see. Signals from his brain congested at its stem before they could reach his fingertips. For the second time, he was locked in his own body and unable to reach out for help… but then, who was there to give it? There was no helping the fact that the world had entirely melted away. All that remained was the altar, the strange orbs, and the open book, the information from which began gushing through an open door and into his head:

_“All that you have ever known is owed to the hatching of the egg, which was the beginning. Arceus emerged as all matter spewed forth into the ether, and all that remained of the egg was the seventeen shards of its tectonic shell, each having meaning carved into it in utero by the thousand hands of Arceus. But the universe they spawned into, beyond the deep pool of matter, was empty. Arceus looked as far as they could see in any direction, and though it stretched out forever, it had no meaning. It only stayed the same, neither living or ever dying. So, they decided, they would create life for death to trail onto. And thus, Palkia and Dialga emerged from nothing; space began to move outwards, matter began to take form, and the march of time began.”_

In plain view, a universe was born, centered on the two unnameable artifacts held on the altar. It progressed in the same vein universes do; stars began to form, obtained gravitational pulls, eventually had planets orbiting them thanks to collisions caused by their gravitational pulls — all for Connor to watch without the ability to interfere. Eventually, the projection changed focus, centering on the one planet he knew: the one orbiting his star, in the middle of his galaxy, floating on the little spec in the cosmos that he called home. Earth was not really home when he saw it, at least not yet. It was more of a nondescript blue-and-green orb that looked a bit silly compared to the rest of the solar system. This was all very cool, and a spectacle if ever there was one, but he couldn’t help but ask: what was the point of this? This didn’t answer any of his questions.

Except something strange happened that moment. Right above his home, the fabric of space seemed to stretch too far and, like a cheap plastic bag, tore open; from it emerged an impossibly shaped meteor. He only saw it for a moment or two, but it didn’t really seem the sort of thing that could be perceived in just three dimensions, nor did it refract the sun’s light as it should have. It was either gold, gray, or not there at all. Then it burst open like a fist above the world, with crimson tendrils on the tips of its countless wings, ready to consume. It was, in a sense, alive.

_“But what is taken from the ether must eventually be returned. In the image of those that ruled space and time came their antithesis: Giratina, lord of worlds beyond comprehension, emerged to strike the gods. Though it was outnumbered, its hundred wings, unbound by the laws of physics, allowed it the upper hand. It landed an endless flurry of crushing blows upon those who denied it repayment, and their retribution fell on deaf ears, all while the mouth through which it emerged swallowed entire solar systems. Time and space hung on the same loose thread as their kings when they fell through our atmosphere, their impact so mighty it split the seas. There they landed, prone and helpless. Had Arceus not intervened, they would have surely died, taking the world with them.”_

Amidst the all-consuming darkness, a halo formed from seventeen divine slabs of rock. Each took a different form, the text on each glowing violently in the same golden hue as the finally materialised holy wheel that plagued these visions. The glow faded into fireflies, lighting up the dark while coalescing into a form that seemed to defy observation, with more arms than could be counted and eyes who sliced the ether like a sword through skin.

_“’O Plates of mine own flesh, lend me your strength just once more. Allow the universe to fight as one, and purge this darkness for all of time.’ Those were the words they spoke as the hands that created everything seized Giratina, bending it into an unfamiliar form long enough for Judgement to be cast. Infinite supernovas scorched the universe, casting forth all of the energy Arceus could muster in one tremendous burst. Giratina was vanquished, sealed in a dimension of its own as punishment. Yet it was Arceus who repaid a debt that day: their body had ruptured in all places, their blood spewed out in wisps of smoke, and they could do no more. Unable to stand, they let out one final cry before their resting place became a shrine out of reach. There they rest forever, to return one day when the final trumpets are blown.”_

In the dying embers of light, there was Sinnoh. Entirely unpopulated, but that was undoubtedly the land he knew: Mount Coronet, a blanket of white bordering it from the north and a sea of green from its south.

But what of the Plates?

_“In time, life blossomed across the land. It was the pixies born of the lake first, whose powers combined to form the first species capable of reproduction — the root of all mortal beings— Mew. After the First Child, other creatures manifested from day and night, the sun and sea, the land, sky, and stars. However, none were blessed with knowledge of where the final fragments of Arceus’s egg lie. When the light cast forth, all were forced into different nooks and crannies of the world, their power never to be reclaimed by mortals.”_

The tone took a pause before returning, poisoned and bitter like ink dripping through his head. The words from the page blurred and vanished, replaced by the voice he'd heard back in the shadowed hallway nearly a lifetime ago: _“But here you are and here I am, bound together in an altar at the end of your world. We are not really here, but the logical path of our shared history leads us to a painful, bitter end. It is all thanks to you, and your horrible, insatiable desire to leave something behind after you exit the mortal plane.”_

One Plate hung in the air, the same colour as excavated brain matter and thicker than any encyclopedia. As hard as he focused, Connor was confused by the words carved upon it:

_“What good is knowing without making the decisions? Will reason keep you safe at night when the killer comes to the door?”_

As if by direction he glanced back from the altar to the doors he’d come through. There was still nobody there. For now, the cathedral was safe from killers, and he couldn’t help but feel he’d just read something entirely irrelevant. Just as soon as the thought hit his mind, the Plate’s sheer radiance burned his eyes, and his pained screaming found no mouth to escape through. He could only look for a second before he had to blink to stop himself from going blind.

When his eyes reopened, he found that a creature had spawned in front of him. It was tiny, feline and pink, soaring through the air with no baggage to weigh it down. He marveled at the creature where it bobbed, only to recoil in shock as it was seized by a colossal three-pronged hand, crushing it within its grasp. The hand belonged to… something akin to what it had just erased, but something entirely divorced from it. For a start, its skin seemed to have lost most of its pigment. Its body was slender, bordering on emaciated were it not for its muscle mass — though, he had to admit, for something with such tremendous arm strength, almost all of that mass went to its legs, chest and neck — and with such a mighty head on thin shoulders that it required what resembled… a second neck? But what stood out most to Connor as it tore the sky asunder was the look behind its eyes.

Its manner was monstrous and intense, so much so that he could not bring himself to look for more than a few seconds. But he sensed that the titan knew it should not have been here. Some grand mistake had been made, as though the pen that recorded destiny had exploded and its ink contaminated the page. Its presence here could not have been a part of the master plan, but here it was, cleaving open the universe and ripping the finely-interwoven threads it was built upon like a sword through yarn.

Innocence. It wanted to claim innocence, but knew it could not. All its life had been hesitation, and its punishment was to face this crimson sky and these final church bells… It was the same scene Connor had just lived through, and was doomed to repeat again. But this time, there was no cathedral to run to; there were no fragments of this reality left to cling on to. There were, instead, one thousand shadowy hands clinging to Connor’s back, dragging him away from the empty stage, all while the same voice that had accompanied him through this apocalypse unlatched itself from him.

In spite of everything they had seen, the tone it took as it spoke to him one more time was not one rooted in anger. Both parties seemed to know that anger would fail to persuade either of them. While still unfaltering and firm as it always was, there was a real air of desperation in its voice that it seemed desperate to hide. But Connor knew how desperation sounded. He would go to the same lengths to hide his own. Maybe, just maybe, the voice really was him; maybe for once, he had finally found a love of himself. But not now. Not in this world. Maybe in another.

Because there was no friendship in the words it spoke:

_“For your sake and mine, please do not come any further. You may find answers to those questions that plague you. You will not like them.”_

They were a warning.


	2. no more the sub-mariner

"Uh- _huh_ _._ I… see."

Dr. Danae Calchas of Floaroma General Hospital's psionics ward had long since stopped smiling by the time Connor had finished talking. She had taken utmost care in taking her notes, which her patient considered the most important piece of literature in his world. The way she studied it implied she took it pretty damn seriously too. She lingered on them until she knew what to say, a moment that came after long, uncomfortable silence. "That's quite a lot, isn't it?"

Connor knew how far-fetched his story was, and felt quite embarrassed about sharing it. That being said, this was his second evaluation in as many days, and it was definitely easier than the first. Yesterday, he was strapped to a chair in a dark room and made to stare at a blank screen while a Gardevoir tried to dismantle his mind and survey them piece by piece. It wasn't technically neurosurgery, he was told; the brain was not being treated as a physical organ, but as a film reel with a psychic projecting it. On the one hand, he wasn't keen on another psychic breaking into his head quite so soon. On the other, he reasoned it was probably necessary: if this technique could put something in his head, it could take it out too. Besides, he knew why his head was being tinkered with this time, he knew what was doing the tinkering… and he had to admit, he was awestruck at seeing a _Gardevoir_ in the flesh. After all, that was the sort of Pokémon with such vast powers that any prospective trainer needed some deeply obscure permits and a _damn_ good reason to even think about keeping one. That being said, even when under anaesthesia, he could still feel her presence moving around in his head. He could tell his sense of awe was definitely not mutual — in fact, he sensed total frustration probe into him and stab around at all the little things that made him Connor as total numbness briefly tore his sense of self away from the void he existed in. He later apologised profusely for causing so much hassle. She seemed a bit puzzled by that.

As infinitely preferable as this was to his head being picked apart by a psychic, he still didn't like it. This was fine; he didn't need to like it. But it still took prodding from Dr. Calchas to talk about what happened. There was something about talking about it in this sterile white room with no support beyond a doctor he didn't really know that put him off. It felt really forced, and he knew she only had good intentions, but he felt like he was being observed… and he was, he supposed. This didn't help him feel any easier. He found himself struggling to get his words out as he stumbled through the whole thing, really wishing he was anywhere other than here. She reminded him that embarrassment was a perfectly normal response to such a personal event, but she needed as much information as possible to determine a treatment. His gut response was to assure her that, actually, he was fine, he didn't warrant the fuss, and the hospital didn't need to worry about him taking space and resources he didn't need. But that didn't suffice here. After having his head hijacked, being forced to watch the end of the world and then being knocked out for three days, even he had to admit defeat. "I'm gonna be honest here, I'm worried. I think I should be? This isn't really a thing that's happened to me before."

"Well, that makes sense. Most people never encounter psychic intrusions of this sort."

That hardly filled Connor with relief. Fiddling around with his hands, he found some solace in touching… anything really. Connor had no criteria to rank the five senses beyond how much he liked them, and knew that such a ranking would've been arbitrary, but touching was easily his favourite. Having things run against his fingers reminded him that he existed as part of a planet. He was still a person who had a body, and not… _not_ that, an option that didn't bear thinking about.

This kept him grounded, because talking through his dream had helped him process it, but it didn't help him forget. In fact, he remembered it acutely. There were many things on his mind. What happened to me? Why did it happen to me? Will I be alright? He kept all of these questions bottled up, and was content to fester in the silence. Yet those final words from the dream kept repeating in his head.

_You may find answers to the questions that plague you. You may not like them._

He found solace in how little he currently knew.

Almost on cue, Dr. Calchas sighed loudly as if to clear her mind before she spoke. "So, for patients who've been admitted after a psionic encounter, recovery tends to come in two stages. The first is dealing with short-term effects, and this is where we're able to pay our closest attention to the patient. In your case, the most immediate short-term effect would be your prolonged bout of unconsciousness, which obviously you are no longer suffering from. Beyond that, though, we try and examine the patient as rigorously as possible to get an accurate picture of their mental state. One part of this is the mind-reading you went through yesterday. Another is this; your testimony of everything of note that's happened since your encounter. Not only can we use this to get a picture of what Pokémon might've done this to you, we can generally use all this to get a pretty reliable picture of how you've been affected."

This didn't sound so bad, until Dr. Calchas swivelled away from Connor to summon some pictures on her computer screen. It wasn't really clear what they meant; they looked like brain scans and readings of some sort, alongside blocks of text made up of words he recognised alone but read like gibberish in sentences. He couldn't decipher it even if he wanted to. But then Dr. Calchas had forgotten more about this subject than he would ever know, and the way her brows knitted before she sighed in defeat did not reassure him.

"Now, I don't exactly know what's happened here, but the results of yesterday's mind-reading were deeply unusual. I don't mean to alarm you, because in spite of this you seem like a fairly normal young man, but whatever it is that you met did something that we couldn't quite get around. The closer our Gardevoir looked at certain parts of your mind, the more your mind actively resisted it and pushed her away — like a defence mechanism, which isn't unheard of, but they usually can't lock out a Gardevoir. Something else that stood out is that, of the more verbal thoughts we could reach, most of them were too disjointed to make out. But what we could decipher… without it, I don't know how much of your story I'd seriously consider here. Not to say you weren't telling the truth or anything, of course, it's just… bizarre. Really bizarre — like, it's unprecedented, honestly. But using what we could, we managed to verify that some parts of your dream seem to have a basis in mostly forgotten mythology."

That was… quite a lot to take in as it was, but Connor sensed he was missing some important information here. A part of him dreaded his urge to know more about this; it wasn't like he could do much with this information except be afraid of it. Still, this happened to _him_ , dammit. He needed to know all the grim details in the hope he could find an answer in them. "How did you verify it, exactly?"

"Well, after we got our results back, we got in touch with the library over in Canalave about some of those phrases we picked up on. Stories about Palkia and Dialga are not particularly uncommon in Sinnese folklore, of course, but it was the name 'Giratina' that stood out. The librarian was only able to find one text that makes use of the name, though time has not been kind to the book. Much of it is unreadable, I'm told. I'm not a historian, so I can't verify this, but apparently it's a fairly ancient record of the Sinnese canon. I am also told that the story of Giratina has long since fallen out of circulation in pretty much every culture with a version of the canonical myths. So… you're right. You have no reason to know about that. We don't know why you do."

Connor didn't say a word about that. What was there to say? It wasn't like the doctor knew much about the story… it wasn't like any other living being did, from the sounds of it. Just Connor. Connor and the… brain intruder.

Dr. Calchas looked back at her notes, hitting Connor with another pang of dread. There was somehow more. "That brings me on to my next point: given how much difficulty we've had in really looking at what happened here, I don't think I could tell you what, exactly, has done this to you. Finding out is in the League's jurisdiction now. The one bit of good news is that it doesn't seem to be affecting your behaviour too much; just from observation, there doesn't seem to be much wrong with you there. However, it's still early, and until we can be a bit more certain of that, there's… simply too much I don't know about this to discharge you for the time being. I'm sorry we couldn't be of more help."

Connor sighed and nodded, totally resigned to his fate. "Please don't worry about it," he said. "It's nobody's fault, honestly." He meant that. There was nothing that Dr. Calchas _needed_ to apologise for, nor was there anything more she could have done. But he certainly didn't blame her for doing so. He wasn't at ease after all of this. Qualified medical professionals were at a loss, too. Being in that situation was hard to find some relief in. But more simply, he just hated that he didn't know the things he needed to know. In that regard, he certainly sympathised with her.

Only at the end of the conversation could Dr. Calchas smile at Connor. It was hardly an authentic smile, sure; it was half-hearted, serving more as a consolation than a sign of real happiness. "Now, in any case, I shan't disturb you any longer; you're free to return to your bed. But first, my main piece of advice is that above all, you should try not to worry. Your brain is no different from everything else in your body, and cannot heal without rest."

He thanked her for all the hard work, got up and made the walk back to his room. It felt like a longer walk than it was; he was not in good spirits, and insinuating he was would've been a lie. He knew he had to clear his mind. Aimlessly speculating about his situation did nothing but hurt him. There was nothing to do except recover and move past the incident, hoping nothing more came of it. But he was unable to think of anything else. Looking into the Windworks incident and bringing its perpetrators to justice was in the hands of the League now. That was… something, at least. No son of Snowpoint had any reason to like the League, truth be told, and Connor was no exception. He could only hope they were better at catching criminals than caring for their cities.

But one thing stuck with him. One question that settled deep in him, casting doubt on any positive outlook he could muster.

Whatever had gotten into his head in the Windworks that day was powerful enough to leave a mark so strong it could ward off a psychic as powerful as a Gardevoir. Not only that, but it told him — no, made him live through — ancient stories no other living human could have known. Whatever this creature was, it was a force Connor was not keen on disturbing a second time. A creature acquainted with ancient myth, capable of granting strange visions, and psionic powers on the far end of the Karellan scale—

No. That was impossible. That was _silly_. There must've been a more reasonable explanation. Connor refused to give it further thought.

That night, he dreamed that hundreds of hands reached out from a dark temple door into the cold. He dreamed of returning to a home that was just beyond reach.

* * *

The days began to blur together quickly enough. There was no room to build a routine in hospital, because there was nothing to do and no activities to cling onto. The closest thing he had was talking to people. This was problematic; he was not a conversational person, and being cooped up in hospital spending most of his time isolated did nothing to change that. He didn't know why he thought it would.

Besides, he didn't really have anyone to talk to face-to-face anyway, outside of one of his Pokémon. Apparently, Dr. Calchas recommended that Connor stay with his starter Pokémon as much as possible while recovering as a means of relieving stress. The Pokémon Centre in town would care for the rest of his team until he was discharged, which was a kick in the teeth but kind of fair. After all, his room was hardly big enough to have three Pokémon roaming around it, and most of the time he was too tired to handle them. He loved them, but for now, it was for the best. Not that Ronnie minded being the centre of attention, of course. He may have been an Aron, but as he curled up next to Connor looking for pets, his trainer wondered if he'd been a Purrloin in his past life.

So he wasn't totally alone, which was a source of privilege. He also had a phone, which meant he had internet connection, and that was about the next best thing. It meant, at least, that he could let Florence know how he was doing. He hadn't spoken to her since the day before the incident, which meant that she must have been getting worried by now.

He opened up Uproar, the messaging app they and most other trainers used, to be greeted by the barrage of barely comprehensible shitposts they'd exchanged when they last spoke. In his absence, she'd said a few things about how her journey was going, up until this morning — the first time she'd said something about his absence. She'd asked if he was okay and said that she was just checking up on him. She had since gone offline, so he began typing:

 **_DogManStaryu:_ ** _ah yeah sorry about that i'm in the hospital_

After hitting "send", Connor was overcome by a wave of instant regret. The last thing he wanted to do was worry her; she was probably busy in Eterna, where dropping everything and heading over to Floaroma and back was more of a whole-day affair that she had no time for. So, as quickly as possible, he elaborated:

 **_DogManStaryu:_ ** _it's not as bad as it sounds, actually! sorry if i worried you there. ronnie and i are mostly fine over here, just kinda waiting until we can go to eterna lol_

He took a photo and attached it to the message. The picture was of Ronnie looking into the camera, his head nestled into his trainer's lap and leaning against the grey of his T-shirt. That was probably enough, he figured; nothing he could do now but wait. Above all, he hoped she was having a good day. He was a bit bummed that Floaroma was so far away from Eterna, really. She was pretty much the only person he knew outside the hospital that he could tell about what happened, and the only one who'd entertain a plan about it. Well, as far as it could be planned around, which wasn't very far, but he just really needed a friend to confide in, face-to-face.

Ronnie looked around, head-bumping Connor in the chest and forcing him to look down. "Ohhh, I know," he said, unable to suppress an uneven grin. "We'll be out soon, don't worry." His restless pal indulged, he glanced back at his phone to see Florence typing:

 **_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _BABY! HIII RONNIE_

 **_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _WAIT FUCK i didn't see the first thing holy shit what happened_

 _ **DogManStaryu:** _ _i don't really know, that's the thing! but i was asleep for a few days and they had to examine me with a gardevoir lol_

 **_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _oh gods that's worrying_

 _ **InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:** _ _any idea when you get out?_

 **_DogManStaryu:_ ** _shouldn't be too long i don't think? i'll let you know when i find out but i def have to talk to you next time i see you_

 **_DogManStaryu:_ ** _i'm a bit worried about it haha_

 **_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _bro i don't blame you that sounds like a LOT_

 **_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _can't believe you met a gardevoir without me though smh_

That was on-brand, and the sort of thing he imagined her saying out loud with a cackle. She was definitely more expressive over the phone, to the point where it was a bit funny. They kept talking for a while before Florence got back to her training, and Connor got back to sitting around wishing he was training, longing to be able to talk to his friend in person.

Of course he'd have to tell her about the dream. All of it. He'd made notes of it all on his phone, making sure every detail went on record, too. He didn't want to forget. He doubted he even could. But this was something that had shaped him; it was too important to not talk about. Florence would believe it, he hoped, and maybe she'd take his ideas about it seriously… or as seriously as they could be taken. They seemed… implausible, but they were the only things that made sense. They weren't even ideas, really, they were speculation he could only hope she'd entertain.

But ideas alone would not accomplish much. Even once they'd spoken about it, once they'd come to a consensus… what then?

Connor tried to stop worrying about it. He got back to doing what he was before, which was staring at the ceiling. Waiting.

* * *

A couple of years ago, if you gave Connor the chance to spend a week alone with Ronnie, he'd have jumped on it without hesitation. Now he was living that reality. He had to admit, he didn't like it. Not that Ronnie was bad company or anything; as a matter of fact, he was beyond grateful that they had this time together. There just wasn't much to do in the hospital room except stew on his thoughts, to think about what happened to him and worry about what would happen next. Moreover, he didn't consider time spent hanging out with his Pokémon to be time wasted, but now that it was the only thing he could do, it really started to get to him. He found he didn't really care for being under such a vigilant eye at all times, either. Sure, it was _necessary_ , but the daily therapy sessions were often fruitless and his completely normal behaviour just frustrated everybody. The only things that had changed were his dreams. They were sharper than usual, often depicting scenes he felt like he knew but couldn't exactly place. He swore they were his memories, but they played out all wrong. He was told that this was apparently normal after an intrusion like this, and that with a bit of luck, he'd soon be sleeping like normal again.

Of course, the one upside was that he'd be free soon enough. After another evaluation, the medical team decided being locked up in hospital any longer would just do more harm than good. Even though a second Gardevoir reading had turned out just as inconclusive (which he was no less apologetic about), whatever was going on up there was hardly killing him. His sleep schedule had readjusted itself and his behaviour showed little cause for concern. He was to be discharged that afternoon.

But first, he had a visitor. As it turned out, in its investigation the eyes of the League had turned to him, and as part of it, Professor Rowan himself had asked for an interview. What was he to say but yes?

Everyone in Sinnoh knew about their head professor, but very few actually _knew_ him, and Connor was not among them. He'd never met the guy, though while he was studying to take his League exams he fell into a rabbit hole of looking online through archives of the great man's lectures and always scrambled to watch new ones whenever they went public. He didn't have a TV in his house, so he'd always nip round to Florence's whenever the professor made one of his yearly public appearances on the news or doing some science documentary or whatever. Beyond that, most of the things he'd read about Professor Rowan were a mix of conjecture and mythology, coming from forums, random Uproar servers, and the odd news article about some poor reporter trying to doorstep him and being told to shove his microphone 'where Arceus ne'er looks'. All things considered, Connor's opinion of Sinnoh's long-serving head professor was one of the highest respect. He was also a bit terrified of ever actually meeting him.

When the interview came around, it was natural that terror bore down on him as he sat and waited. He swore a hungry Mandibuzz secretly glared at him from the ceiling. Professor Rowan himself almost certainly had many things he'd rather do than interrogate some kid about how he got himself put in a hospital. Sure, it may have been part of his job, but there were surely much cooler things he could've been doing — and worst of all, it was Connor's own fault that he'd done this. This was how he was going to meet his hero, then; through abysmal failure. Until the professor arrived, keeping Ronnie occupied was the one thing that kept him from itching his skin off just to ease the nerves.

Rowan had to arrive eventually. Just as Connor was wondering when, he walked through the door.

It was without much fanfare, as though this was just another work outing for him. He wasn't in much hurry; he wasn't smiling — he rarely was — but he didn't seem particularly stressed either. His presence alone seemed to cast a shadow from the window to the wall; he must have had well over a foot on Connor, and he adorned a beard like an elder Walrein would its tusks. "Sorry to have kept you waiting there, lad," he said as he hung up his coat. "I'd say it was the traffic, but actually I flew here."

Connor didn't really know how to respond to that, so he nodded without saying a word. Only after this did he realise this was a joke. By then, it was too late to laugh.

"Right," Rowan said as he laid a notepad on the table. "First things first: what's your name, young man?"

"Full name?"

Rowan expected him to follow that up with something. Connor also realised this too late, however, and found himself being peered at through thick reading glasses. "Full name, yes."

"…Right, yeah. Sorry about that. Uh, Connor, sir; er, Connor Murdoch, of Snowpoint—"

"That'll do. Now, Connor, listen to me. I promise you're not in trouble — for all intents and purposes, you're a witness here, and _not_ a suspect. I'm only here to ask you some questions about what happened the day you were in the Windworks. The only thing I need from you is a set of honest answers, and then I'll be out of your hair. Is that okay?"

"Sure! That's fine by me." Connor knew that that alone was the answer he should have given. But it wasn't the full, honest answer, which was the one he felt _obliged_ to yammer out. "I'll be as helpful as I can, but I have to warn you, I doubt that'll be very helpful. I didn't _see_ a whole lot, really; I certainly didn't get a glimpse of any other people. I just kind of went in and got knocked out by a weird thing nobody can identify, then I had a, uh… a vision, I think. Or a dream. Then I woke up in hospital."

"Don't be so hard on yourself; that's much better than nothing." Rowan laughed as he said this, though in the weird way where he didn't actually laugh — rather, it was implied. It animated those big shoulders of his for a second, and gave him the closest thing Connor had ever seen to his smile. "If I didn't think I could work with your input, then I wouldn't be here. But I am here. Because I believe you're the most valuable person on hand."

"…Er, forgive me if this is too many questions or anything; what about the guy they kidnapped? He saw the people who did this; he was awake the whole time, wasn't he? Did he get their names?"

"I've already spoken to Mr. Kostopoulos, of course. Did that two days ago. You and him were the only two witnesses we had, really, and it seems he was the only one who saw his captors." Rowan seemed disappointed when he said this, or at least more disappointed than Connor would've expected; surely he wasn't a more promising witness than _that_ guy? Witnesses didn't come more promising than that — some were killed for seeing less than that! (Not that he should've been killed, of course; Connor cursed himself for even entertaining this thought. It was lovely news that he'd been reunited with his daughter in one piece, and had even been kind enough to send a card and some chocolates. Connor hoped he was having a good day.) Still, Rowan was certainly disappointed as he said this… or maybe resigned, as though he too wished there were better options. "Unfortunately, much of what we got out of him was of frustratingly little use. Not that it was his fault, of course. This Team Galactic thing that they've got going on, they're good at hiding their tracks, and I don't care for it."

A name. That was a name — Connor had a _name_ to look for now, and that was just what he needed. Not that he could even hint he was looking for them, mind; they'd think he was mad and keep him in hospital, or revoke his license for constantly endangering himself. So he just nodded. "That sounds frustrating. I… hope I'm of assistance, then."

"Sure. But first… I don't want to delay the interview proper much longer, so forgive my indulgence here: what's the story with your little fellow there?"

"What?" he said, in spite of the fact he'd heard Rowan's question; it just took him a moment to process who the little fellow in question was. As though it could've been anyone else. Connor hadn't even realised Rowan had been in a friendly staring match with Ronnie until this point; after all, Ronnie was hardly anything except his pleasant, quiet little self here.

"You said you were from Snowpoint, right? You don't see Aron much up around there at all. Yet you two seem to be pretty close. I'd like to hear about that—" Rowan realised just how forward he was being and stopped himself in his tracks, as though he'd committed some great faux pas or something. "This is— only if you have time, of course; I don't want to keep you too long."

Connor found his hesitation a bit odd. This wasn't pushy at all. This was a bloody delight, actually! It felt a bit silly to say this, but his own Pokémon were his area of expertise, and he got to talk about them to _him_ of all people — this was the stuff of dreams! He would've laughed, but it wasn't funny so much as it was really cool — like a celebrity moving next door to compliment your slippers kind of cool; it was hard not to bask in it, and he'd definitely be talking about it to Florence later— but he remembered had more talking to do now.

"Oh, right, sorry; zoned out there — uhh, this is Ronnie, he's _technically_ my starter, but I've had him since… gods, I dunno how old I was, really? One of my neighbours when I was little used to work for Fuego who retired in… I think it was when my mum was still young, back in the 70s? Anyway, he had some Pokémon to help 'round the iron works; kept them, became a breeder up in Snowpoint. Everyone knows each other in Snowpoint, really, so half the town were friends of the family but him in particular… I think he watched both my parents grow up, and they were always pretty close to his Pokémon — and so was I. It was really cool, actually; you'd get people going up to Snowpoint just for it, which, y'know, it was _nice_ when people came to visit, because they rarely do nowadays — anyways, one of his Aggron had a litter, and Mum decided to take one off his hands so I wouldn't get lonely on my own in the house. I could barely speak; I was like five and hardly an expert on names, so I called him Ronnie. Turns out it stuck — Mum always said that Dad swore by the Sabbath, and that I was just like his little mini-me. Weird how that happens, y'know?"

He didn't expect Rowan to sit and listen to the whole thing without interrupting, and found it even weirder that he was seriously interested. But Connor found himself really getting into the story, as it turned out, and it was so nice to have someone to listen. By the time he was finished, he was acutely aware he'd gotten too into it. "Gods, I'm sorry; I'm really keeping this interview off, aren't I?"

Not that the professor seemed to care, of course. He seemed genuinely content, which was happier than most times Connor could ever remember seeing him. There was almost a glint in his eyes, and getting dangerously close to a smile. "Thank you for sparing such little detail. It's very interesting, the effect one little choice can have on someone years down the line. It was, of course, a series of random choices made from chance that led Ronnie to meet you, but isn't it remarkable how we form such great bonds from totally random circumstances? In any case, I'm sure your Pokémon's happy to know you too."

Yeah, thought Connor. That was damn cool, actually. Thinking about existential stuff was mostly beyond him, because he was absolutely tiny in an infinite universe and would never know what mark he left on it all when all was said and done. But he could get behind that, knowing that his friends were happy. "Thanks."

"Of course. Now, are we ready to proceed with the interview?"

"O-oh! Yeah, sure; of course!"

With an emphatic nod, Rowan laid the tape recorder on the table before him — like him, it was an old thing that had clearly seen much use, but was no less dependable for it. With one click, the reel began to roll. "Statement of Connor Murdoch, regarding his encounter with Team Galactic in the Valley Windworks on the seventh of March, 2019. Statement taken directly from subject on the eighteenth of March, 2019; interview conducted by Head Professor Bryn Rowan of the Sinnoh League. Statement begins."

Connor was, of course, as thorough and clear as he could possibly be in his account: his meeting with Mr. Kostapoulos's daughter, his venture into the Windworks, his… encounter, and the vision, and all the things of note that had happened since. All of it was committed to record. He found that talking about it with Rowan helped put things in some semblance of order, though not that it gave him a great epiphany. It was easier to think that things happened in one specific order. But Team Galactic was on his mind. That was who Rowan said were behind this. He knew nothing of them — nor did the professor — but if they were an organisation… then they had a grander plan, surely? They wanted to _do_ something, and interfering in the Windworks… having that ability to do that to him… all of that was a part of that.

Why?

"…End of statement."

Rowan hit stop on the tape recorder and the air was cleared with a click. That was that. He wasted no time packing up. "Thank you for your cooperation in this matter, Connor. It is sincerely appreciated."

"Oh! Uh, no problem at all; thank you for listening! I hope it's helpful, uhh — good luck in your investigation and everything."

Rowan nodded gratefully, and then shrugged his coat back over his shoulders. His hand was on the doorknob when he stopped, as though he'd forgotten something. Connor spent a split-second trying to figure out what when the professor turned back around. "Now, your next gym is Eterna, isn't it?"

Connor blinked at the non-sequitur. "Aye."

"Then I wish you the best of luck in that. You seem like an interesting lad — good luck with your journey; I know Snowpoint is grateful. May we meet again in more certain times."

With that, he was gone, and Connor was left to think. The overwhelming sense of malaise had not left him, but meeting Rowan had given him… another feeling. One that sat opposite resignation. One that wasn't quite hope, but one that resembled it. He welcomed it.

So Team Galactic, then. Looking for them was now his raison d'être. Well, that and Snowpoint, of course; he had gym badges to collect and ten days fewer to do so in. Time was of the essence. But Team Galactic… if they had anything to do with that vision, if that vision meant anything, then this was greater than him, greater even than Snowpoint. He was, of course, not in a position to take action here; he was just a kid with one gym badge, a Pokémon, one friend and all this knowledge that nobody else had — and of all the unique gifts he could've gotten, of course it had to be this one.

All of that was bad enough, but there was the thing that equipped him worst of all for this: curiosity. He had it in spades. And he knew he'd regret it, but he vowed to do all that he could to find what he was looking for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies for the delay! college happened, and is still happening but i'm hoping it doesn't stop me from posting for four months next time. your readership is appreciated as ever <3


	3. the forest

Connor’s time in Floaroma wasn’t particularly happy, but that didn’t mean he wanted to leave. In fact, he found himself a little sad that his time in town didn’t let him appreciate how lovely it was. Floaroma was a quaint little town that reminded him of home, just smaller and much more colourful with the scores of Gracidea flowers marking the meadows. As the story went, these flowers were given as gifts of gratitude. They bloomed every year as a show of thanks to the migrating Shaymin who fertilised the soil and brought life to the land in years gone by. That was very long ago, of course; whether Shaymin even existed anymore was a source of contention. Connor hoped they did, and that one day they’d come back home.

Maybe someday he’d come back here, too, under better circumstances than these.

Upon leaving the hospital, he wasted little time in making preparations to move on from the quiet floral town. Before setting off he wanted to visit Mr. Kostopoulos and his daughter to make sure they were both alright, but he had no idea where they lived and finding out felt intrusive. Besides, Professor Rowan said they were fine, and Connor took his word on that. He had no reason not to — in fact, he could still scarcely believe it. The head professor of the Sinnoh league himself had shown up in the flesh to talk to _him_ of all people, and by some divine miracle, he hadn’t made a mess of it! That was something to be proud of, at least. With some luck, they’d meet again some time down the road.

Once again, Connor hoped, better circumstances.

Leaving town at two o’clock in the afternoon meant that he’d have to find some place to sleep along the path and continue his journey the following morning. This also meant that he would have to wait a day before seeing another Pokémart. As such, he picked up some supplies for his Pokémon before leaving — all three of them, now that he was out of hospital.

Most prominent on his shopping list was Pokémon food. He picked up some iron ore for Ronnie, which was stocked at most reputable Pokémarts and did not leave Connor worrying about which brands to buy. It was also pretty cheap. One kilogram of the stuff cost about 150 dollars — around the same price as two litres of lemonade — and lasted a healthy Aron for two days.

Keeping his other Pokémon fed wasn’t much of a problem either. Rottenhat, being a Staravia, ate just about anything. The pickiest eater of the bunch was his Shellos, Wendy, but fortunately her preferred brand of seaweed pellets weren’t terribly hard to find. It helped she was neither particularly active nor a voracious eater.

The only other thing he got was some kindling wood for the fire they would inevitably huddle around in the woods that night. With everything in his arms he went to the shopkeeper to pay. She took everything and began packing it in Pokéballs.

“Kindle wood… I take it you’re out camping, then?” said the cashier.

“Aye,” said Connor. “I’m heading off to Eterna for my next badge, so I’m gonna be spending the night in the forest. Wouldn’t want to freeze, now, would I?”

“Oh, so you’re a trainer! Best of luck to you, then! Are you going to be visiting the haunted old chateau?”

“Cheers—”

It took him a second to process that last sentence, but when it hit him it made him pause for a second or two. A haunted old chateau in the woods was certainly news to him, which… was a shock; this was the sort of thing he was all over. “Uh, sorry, I don’t— this is my first time hearing about this. _Haunted?_ ”

“Sure is!” The shopkeeper grinned wide, clearly relishing her chance to play lecturer. “Centuries ago, it goes, wealthy family hacked down half of the forest and drove out the native Pokémon to build that house. They lived in that house for centuries — until the forties, in fact — when they just… disappeared. The house was left to ruin. The wildlife returned to the forest, which had long since regrown by then. You’re legally allowed to go into the house, of course, and though people have tried, nobody’s torn it down yet. But it’s not uncommon to hear noises inside. Ones that don’t seem to come from anywhere: the laughter of little girls, the ringing of dinner bells… you may even see ghosts of the family as they lived more than seventy years ago, looking back at you. They might ask you to play, serve you invisible food, and grant you a bed to spend the night in. I can’t verify any of these, but there are reports of gallivanting trainers the same age as yourself having a look inside… and never coming out.”

That was cool, Connor thought. He wasn’t sure why a cashier was telling him this, exactly. But he was more than grateful for it. Besides, he couldn’t (and didn’t want to) tell her what to do on the job. He had some questions about the story, though. “If it’s haunted and ruined, why does the government not just tape it off and renovate it? Like, they own the land, don’t they?”

“That’s… not the reaction I usually get,” said the cashier to nobody in particular. From the corner of her eye, she noticed Connor blink at her without a word. She cleared her throat before continuing. “No, no, they do; there was an eminent domain case about it a while back, and nobody stepped forward to claim the property.”

“…So why don’t they? Surely it’s a matter of public safety, if people are disappearing in there.”

“I don’t know. I’m a cashier, not a journalist.”

“Oh, right, of course. Sorry.”

“Not yet, anyway. This job’s helping me through college, heheh.”

“Oof,” winced Connor, who did not envy the dual workload. “Best of luck! I’m not ready for college yet, myself. I’ve got the whole trainer’s challenge to do first. Well — I want to do it, of course, but even if I didn’t, I sort of have to. It’s for personal reasons, y’know?”

“That’s just how it is sometimes. I take it you graduated from an academy?”

“The Academy of Snowpoint.”

“Oh, may the gods be with you, then! It’s been a few years since a Snowpoint trainer really made waves, hasn’t it? I don’t think I remember ever seeing one get all eight badges, though. I don’t know if my parents have, either. No offence, of course.”

“None taken,” said Connor. He couldn’t exactly judge her for making conversation, as discouraging as the reminder was. But she wasn’t wrong in what she said.

“Anyway, I’ll stop talking your ear off and let you pay for these. Once again, best of luck in what you’re doing. I’ll keep an eye out for you, and if you get past Canalave… well, you’ll be too famous for the likes of me, but I’ll buy you a drink if I ever get the chance.”

Canalave was gym number six on the standard circuit. Connor wasn’t sure of the exact number, but the story went that of every hundred trainers that started the journey, ten of them made it as far as fighting Byron. Half that number actually beat him. There were far fewer than a hundred that came out of Snowpoint each year, of course, and that number got smaller year upon year. Connor and Florence made up two-fifths of their output for this year. One Snowpoint trainer had made it to that last five per cent in the last six years. Moira Rosencrantz, who later suffered the indignity of getting knocked out in her own hometown. She was also Florence’s sister, and it was by no coincidence that trainers ran in the family.

Connor wished the cashier a lovely day and continued down the road ahead. He now knew that somewhere off that road lay a haunted house, the sort of thing that never would have fallen into his lap otherwise. Rushing into it headfirst and alone was a bad idea, and the mere thought of having a similar incident to the one in the Windworks exhausted him.

But for whatever reason, he knew he had to go in there. For one, the deal with this one was more obvious than with the Windworks. All he knew about that before going in was that someone needed rescuing, which hardly clued him on to supernatural happenings. Even if charging in there with one badge worth of experience was so clearly a _horrible_ idea, the more he thought about it. This, on the other hand? It was a haunted house. That just meant it was a house inhabited by ghosts.

There was no need for him to go it alone, either. He could tell Florence he was checking it out beforehand. She was likely still in the area and probably knew of the house, having passed through the woods herself. Moreover, this was exactly her sort of thing. He pulled out his phone, opened Uproar and hammered out a message to her.

**_DogManStaryu:_ ** _hey, forgive me if this is a weird question. i’m heading out to eterna right now, and someone’s just told me there’s a haunted chateau in eterna forest. what is the deal there, firstly, and secondly, would you be down to meet me there? i get it if you’re not though and i’m def not surprised if you’re already out of eterna_

A few minutes later, she replied:

**_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _DUDE_

**_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _i’d love to!! the old chateau is honestly so fascinating! i’ll not spoil why it’s called that or what’s in it but it’s so cool?? i can definitely show you around! meet you at the forest entrance?_

**_DogManStaryu:_** _sounds good beo! i’ll see you there_ _:)_

**_DogManStaryu:_ ** _*bro_

**_InTheCourtOfTheNidoqueen:_ ** _no no beo is good actually_

**_DogManStaryu:_ ** _…fair enough, i suppose!_

* * *

It came as no small relief to see Florence for the first time in nearly two weeks. She was leaning against the signpost outside the forest’s entrance, grinning at him. Ponty, her Piplup, stood waiting alongside her. Of course they’d beaten him there, Connor thought. He smiled back at them and started jogging down the last bit of the path. Ronnie struggled to keep up alongside him, having been walking uninterrupted until long after sunset. Being an Aron, he was not built for trekking.

“Took you long enough to get here,” said Florence, smug as a Wooper in mud. “Let me guess, you couldn’t pry yourself away from the continental breakfast?”

As usual, she was already cracking wise. Connor exaggerated a sigh and threw his arms up in defeat. “They had to kick me out, sadly. I’m not rich enough for the finest things the hospital can offer, like fancy Kalosian cuisine or neurosurgery. But I did meet a Gardevoir, which was nice!”

Florence just rolled her eyes as she always did at his bad jokes. “You still have to tell me about how you even got admitted, by the way. You can’t just spring that on me and not tell me what went down. Besides, you owe it to me because that’s my favourite Pokémon, you scoundrel!”

“Yeah, sorry about that, haha. It’s… a bit silly, honestly. I’ll tell you about it in a bit,” said Connor. “You look lovely, by the way! Have you done something new with your hair? It suits you.”

“Aw, thank you!” she replied. She’d wrangled up her chestnut curls and tied them up at the back, letting them fall across her nape. She looked genuinely happy with the results, her sarcastic grin softening into something more sincere. “It was a bit of a pain wrestling everything into a good shape, but I think it was worth the effort. Looks a bit pastoral with the outfit, right?”

Connor nodded. Her flowing pink tunic and the way she carried herself, with her hand on her hip and a wry smile on her face, called to mind a rare Roserade coloured in pastel. He owned the happiness that bubbled in his stomach at the sight. She was damn good at being proud, and she spread the feeling like it was a rare stomach bug.

“Anyway, I believe you want to see the Old Chateau! Follow me — I’ll be damned if it’s not the wildest thing you’ve ever seen _._ ”

That was a bold claim. But then Connor still had to tell her about the Windworks, he remembered. That was going to take some beating.

“By the way,” she began, “how’s Ronnie doing? Excited to kick Gardenia’s arse, no doubt.”

“Yeah, he’s gonna ace it! Aren’t you, buddy?” Connor turned to his Pokémon, who grunted happily back at him. Ronnie was already in a great position to take her on by virtue of his Steel typing. The only potential snag was her Turtwig, which was infamous for knowing Grass Knot. Pokémon more powerful than him had fallen victim to it. It could take out Grotle with that move, and it had left a surprising number of trainers humiliated after their strongest Pokémon fell victim to an unevolved form of itself.

The most baffling part of it was that these people didn’t think to fight her Turtwig with a Flying-type Pokémon. They were far less heavy and staggeringly easy to come across, after all. Connor had his Staravia, and Florence her Murkrow. “Oh,” said the former, “that reminds me, I take it you’ve beaten Gardenia already?”

“Sure have.” Florence took out her badge case and opened it in front of him, the second slot filled by her Forest Badge. It took the form of three trees fit together in the shape of green diamonds, with little white tree trunks carved into them. “You’ll definitely be fine, if I’m perfectly honest. An Aron and Staravia should be enough to brick-wall her. I mean, I got through a good chunk of it with just the Murkrow. Thought it was a bit of a pain negotiating Ponty out of taking part, especially when she’s so close to evolving, aren’t you?”

Ponty squeaked back, her little teal flippers flapping in utter indignation at Florence’s side.

“I swear, she’s the most uppity Pokémon I’ve ever met,” sighed Florence. “It’s a wonder her head doesn’t burst, it’s so big.”

“Well,” said Connor, stopping in his tracks to crouch and look the Piplup in the face. “You’ll just have to kick the hiney of the poor gym leader you see next, won’t you?”

She turned back to face him as she kept waddling along. She didn’t make a sound, but simply nodded at him as though she were a princess regarding an admiring subject.

“Don’t feed into her ego,” said Florence. “By the time she’s fully grown, she’ll be more self-important than Mew.”

They kept walking through the forest, sticking firmly to the path. Connor didn’t particularly want to waste time battling wild Pokémon when he was going somewhere with his friend. Besides, as he looked at the tall grass, he noticed how dark it was outside the pools of light cast by the old, black lampposts scattered along the path.

However, despite the darkness, Connor noticed plenty of Grass- and Bug-types that called Eterna Forest home: Wurmple, Budew, Silcoon, Cascoon, Seedot, Kricketot, and even the odd Roselia. That made the forest an ideal training ground for Gardenia’s gym, and also a rich ecosystem he would’ve loved to get lost in. Maybe not after sundown, though.

Further into the woods, the wind carried a newfound chill. It became harder to avoid the bugs here. Silcoon and Cascoon hung from tree branches like sentient sleeping bags, their protruding eyes following Connor as he passed through. There were no wild Beautifly at this time of day; when the moon was out, their nocturnal brethren were about. A Dustox flew across the path, the flap of its wings mere feet from his face. The pair of them stopped dead in their tracks at the sight, watching as it landed on the bark of a nearby tree.

Connor was always caught off guard at just how big Dustox were. At a minimum, they were about four foot tall from the tip of their antennae to the bottom of their wings, and their wingspan must have been even bigger. Compared to Mothim or Beautifly, there was something a little bit ridiculous about them. Maybe it was their size. Maybe it was their faces. They always seemed to be smiling, yet their big yellow eyes hung onto their face like pouches furrowed by an invisible brow. Just from a conceptual standpoint, Connor thought, they walked a fine line between malicious and silly. He couldn’t help but respect that.

“Psst.” Florence nudged him, then gestured to one of her four Pokéballs like a thief who gleefully held something they shouldn’t have, even if it didn’t hurt anybody. “I caught one of those while I was passing through,” she whispered. “She’s so cool!”

Connor stared at the ball intently, his eyes almost bulging out of his head. “Oh, I bet she is! What’s her name?”

“Bimp.”

“ _Bimp?”_

She waved a hand dismissively. “It was the first thing that came to mind, and funnily enough, she happened to like it. I dunno what else to tell you. Besides, it’s a good name, if I say so myself.”

“Hey, I don’t disagree! I support Bimp in her endeavours! I just had to make sure I heard you right, is all.”

“Well then,” said Florence, “I’ll just have to tell her about your qualified support.”

“Well,” replied Connor, “thank you for doing so.”

They kept on going down the path until Florence went into the tall grass, which Connor almost said something about. He took a look around at the area, though, and noticed that there didn’t seem to be any Pokémon living there. In fact, the grass barely seemed alive. The only thing that moved it was the chill wind blowing through the area.

“Not long to go now.” Florence didn’t turn back as she said this.

Something felt off about this bit of the forest. As he kept walking, Connor took a look at the trees around him and found himself deeply uncomfortable. They were decrepit, hollowed-out old things, their roots popping out of the ground and their drooping branches unadorned by leaves. Moreover, they seemed… more distant than they were earlier. Not just in the sense that they were further away from him, mind; they were further away from each other, too. This space gave a home to the thick fog he swore wasn’t there before, which turned everything further than a foot away from him into a silhouette and made almost everything else disappear.

This was all Connor could see through the fog, for the most part. He even had a hard time seeing Florence in front of him, and could only just make out her face turning back here and there to make sure he hadn’t got lost himself. The chill wind kept blowing all the while, and it sent shivers down his spine.

Everything Connor had heard about this place seemed much less far-fetched now. As a matter of fact, he had his own theory about it. Maybe the ghosts of the chateau were not human spirits, he thought. Maybe they were the ghosts of trees, who had taken up a different form to trick those intruding on the area. This thought wasn’t exactly reassuring, nor was he quite sure where he got the idea from — it was wildly implausible, though here, it seemed otherwise. If nothing else, he got a kick out of picturing it Standard trees, innocent enough in the human world, dying and being reborn as angry spirits who drove rich people out of house and home and then pretended to be their ghosts. After all, the spiteful, petty tendencies of nature were certainly not new to Sinnoh.

Eventually, Florence stopped walking and crouched at the side of a tree alongside Ponty. Her voice dropped to a whisper as she turned to Connor. “Alright,” she said, “here we are. Notice anything odd?”

Sure enough, the strangest thing happened: the fog cleared right before the pair of them, revealing a spacious garden through which a path lay to the widest house Connor had ever seen. It was also the most dilapidated house he’d ever seen, and it was evident nothing (or at least, nothing that still lived) had called it home for a long time now. The crimson wood that adorned it had long since been chipped away, and the granite that formed most of the walls was eroded and caked in filth. The vastness darkness of the windows only helped draw attention to how dirty they were, caked in thick dust around the edges. Funnily enough, the people that had put the most effort into cleaning them were clearly intruding trainers, who rubbed big spots out of the dust to get a look inside. What was more, tiles had started to fall off the roof and scatter on the ground like the most half-arsed mosaic ever attempted. The house itself was not a pleasant sight, ravaged by time as it was. But its sheer size and faded grandeur made Connor certain that, seventy years ago, this house would’ve been far more impressive than depressing.

Yet, the garden was perfectly fine. The trees surrounding the chateau from the rear were still blackened husks, but if there were no ghostly house behind the garden, Connor would’ve guessed that someone still tended to it. Flowers of all different kinds grew in neat patterns, forming stripes of yellow, blue, and pink between ornately trimmed hedges that decorated the path into the garden. 

“Well, yeah,” Connor whispered back. “There’s the, uh… everything, really. This must be the place, mustn’t it?”

Florence nodded slowly, a satisfied grin on her face. “I have to say, I think the flowers are a bit tasteless, all things considered, but where else do you get the chance to see things like this? And the best part is, that’s just the _outside._ ”

“What can I expect from the _inside_ then, exactly? Not, like, in the ‘spoil everything for me’ sense, but is there anything I should know about and avoid so that I don’t die?”

“From what I’ve heard, the main thing is to keep your distance from the televisions,” said Florence. “And every electrical device, really. Don’t touch anything that has a voltage unless you’re asked to. Actually, just don’t touch anything that looks expensive unless you’re told. Just treat this like you’re the guest of some people you don’t want to annoy. I’m not entirely sure I needed to tell _you_ of all people that, but you know, just to make extra sure we get out of this safe.”

“I see,” said Connor. This was all reasonable enough, though by her description, these rich people were no less materialistic dead than alive. “This may be a silly question, but… how will I know if I’m asked, exactly?”

“Well, they’ll ask you.”

“Oh.”

Florence chuckled. “Don’t worry, they’re… well, they’re not really _nice_ ghosts, from experience. They’re kind of dicks, actually, but they’re mostly harmless if you’re respectful of them. That’s… mostly just what I’ve heard, actually. I’ve only been here once, but I’ve met them and I promise you’ve not got much to fear here. As a matter of fact,” she said, gesturing to another Pokéball on her belt, “I even caught a Gastly here. There’s nothing too bad in there. You definitely still wanna go in?”

Connor took a deep breath and another look at the house. He remembered that, whatever was going on here, the likely worst possible outcome was still far better than what came out of the Windworks incident. Besides, he had his Pokémon at the ready this time, and he was far more prepared for the paranormal. He swallowed his doubts and smiled at Florence. “Sure,” he said. “Let’s go.”

“Hell yeah, brother.”

As the two of them made their way down the path across the garden and around a long-disused stone fountain, Connor had a thought. “Actually,” he said, “don’t you mean _beother_?”

Florence paused outside the big red doors that led into the house, and slowly turned to look at him. “You cheeky little shit,” she said, stifling a laugh. “C’mon in.”

He went in first, with Ronnie closely behind. As Florence moved to follow, she noticed Ponty pouting at her. She refused to budge, so Florence simply picked up her Piplup and headed down the dark hallway. Behind her, the door slammed shut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> boy howdy that sinnoh news, huh! that should hopefully kick me into gear for getting this written more quickly than I have been, especially over summer. my goal for 2021 is to get the first bit of this fic done, I've decided. feel free to hold me to that, haha
> 
> also! I have gone ahead and made a discord server for this fic if you feel so inclined to chat about it: <https://discord.gg/x6NchkCmwb>


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